SUMMARY: How
Jack's promotion scene in New Order could and maybe should have played out

DISCLAIMER: I do
not own Stargate SG-1. Stargate SG-1 and its characters are the property of
Showtime/Viacom, MGM/UA, Double Secret Productions, and Gekko Productions. I
have written this story for entertainment purposes only. No money has exchanged
hands. No copyright infringement is intended. This story may not be posted
elsewhere without the consent of the author.

Jack stood outside the gate room
and nervously wiped at the stars on his shoulders. Brigadier General Jack
O’Neill. A one-star general. Next rung up the ranking ladder. The title still
sounded strange to him. He felt like he had bitten off more than he could chew,
but even Daniel had asked who knows better how to run the base. He was probably
right – Daniel always was. Jack knew how to deal with the daily ins and outs
of the SGC, what was needed, how it felt to be one of the soldiers risking life
and limb through the wormhole…

Damn, he still didn’t want to
be in charge of anything. He didn’t want to be “the man.” He just wanted
the prestige, the paycheck and the parking space.

Brigadier General.

He did like the sound of that,
even if it meant he had to be “the man.”

He listened through the closed
door as Doctor Weir gave her farewell speech. It wasn’t that he didn’t like
Weir; he didn’t really have an opinion about her. Even if she did okay
negotiating with the Goa’uld, the truth was that she was completely
unqualified for the job of running the base. She had tried; Jack could give her
credit for that. She knew her limitations, knew what she could and couldn’t
do, and relied on more experienced people to handle the things she couldn’t.
That and red tape slowed down the process to a crawl at times, and they were in
a business where crawling wasn’t an option.

She didn’t really have any
leadership skills – maybe that was the main reason why the president appointed
Daniel to be the second-in-command of the base. Everyone on the base followed
his orders even though he didn’t
really order people around. He’d ask, personnel would do, it was a good
arrangement. Besides, Daniel had been praised for his ability to work with both
civilian and military and help them to work together. He was a natural. When
Weir was put in charge, many of the military personnel were uncomfortable with a
civilian commander. Daniel was the perfect go-between.

The reasons behind the
president’s appointment for Daniel were sneaky and practical. It was the type
of sneakiness Jack could appreciate, and he couldn’t wait to tell Daniel all
the little details behind his job promotion, but he had a job to do first. The
president had given him his first order as a general.

After the president pinned the stars on Jack’s shoulders and saluted
him, he said, “Brigadier General Jack O’Neill, as your commanding officer, I
hereby order you to correct an egregious oversight made not only by myself but
by my predecessor and not to mention a few high ranking government and military
officials. It has come to my attention that a certain individual of your command
has not been rewarded or acknowledged for his actions.”

His first order given to him by
his commander-in-chief, and it was one he was happy to carry out. It was a shame
that neither Hammond nor the president could be there. With the political unrest
concerning the Antarctic base, they both had a lot of work to do and couldn’t
spare a day to visit the SGC yet.

He heard Weir’s voice though
the door. “Although my time here has been brief, it has been, without a doubt,
indelible. I will remember every one of you, and I thank you all for your hard
work. I'm not one for long goodbyes, so without further ado, it is with great
pleasure I introduce you to your new commanding officer, Brigadier General Jack
O'Neill.”

Showtime.

The gate room door opened, and
Jack stood up straight. As he walked in, he saw Carter, Teal’c and every
person in the room come to attention, even Daniel who was nearest to the podium.
That was probably the one and only time Daniel would ever stand at attention in
his presence – Jack wondered if the gate room cameras were recording the
event. He needed good blackmail material.

He walked up the ramp to the
podium as Weir moved away. Looking out over the small group assembled in front
of him, he felt like he was now a breed apart. This is what it was going to be
like being “the man.” He wasn’t just “one of the guys” anymore.

He cleared his throat, and
immediately said, “At ease.” As the group relaxed, he saw Daniel’s little
grin. Oh, yeah. That was the one and only time his friend was ever going to
stand at attention. Ah, well, to business. “You all know how much I love speeches, so I'll make this short and sweet. I wish I could say
I didn't owe anything to anyone or that I got here on my own, but the truth is I
wouldn't be standing here if it wasn't for the courage and support of each and
every person here at this base. We’ve pulled through some rough times
together, both here and off world, so I hope I can be as good a leader as we've
had in the past and as good as you deserve.”

Daniel was the first to respond
with “Hear, hear!” and started applauding. As usual, everyone followed suit.
The president was right. Daniel would have made an exceptional commander of the
SGC. People followed where he led even if he wasn’t aware of it.

Jack held up his hand to quiet
the room. “The other reason I took this job was so I could do really cool
stuff like this. I’d like to tell you a story. I’ll try to keep it short
too.

“Eight years ago, I was
brought to
Cheyenne
Mountain
by General West in case Doctor Langford’s team got this big round thing
behind me working. The government had had the gate for around 70 years and
accidentally got it to work once, then shut down the project after they thought
there was a tragic accident. Doctor Langford and her team had been working on it
since the late 60’s. There were some specialized teams working on it for two
years before I was brought in, and no one alive had any idea how to make it work
or knew what it did. The linguists had spent years trying to translate the
hieroglyphs on the cover stone they found in
Giza
, and they were still staring at the drawings when I showed up. The research
wasn’t going anywhere until Doctor Langford convinced a certain archaeologist
by the name of Doctor Daniel Jackson to come here to work on this, and
thankfully for all of us, he did.”

Jack saw Daniel squint his eyes
at him. He’d been able to completely surprise Daniel. Finally. He wasn’t
expecting anything since it was supposed to be Jack’s day. Good. Jack wanted
this to be a big surprise.

“The moment he got here, he
re-translated what the linguists got wrong and named the big round thing the
stargate. In two weeks, he did what no one could intentionally do in seventy
years. He opened up the universe for us.”

Jack looked out at the audience
in front of him, saw heads nodding in agreement, saw Teal’c smirking, Carter
standing at semi-attention. But Daniel? He still looked completely baffled.

“We went to
Abydos
, met some folks, killed a god wannabe and found out that the universe is much
bigger than we originally thought.” Jack looked down for a moment, and then
looked up again. He wanted what he said next to make an impact. “A lot’s
happened to all of us since then; everything from switching bodies to being
frozen to traveling to alternate realities. We’ve been though… stuff that
would make a professional soldier want to turn tail and run. A lot of that has
happened to Daniel, yet he’s never once given up. He’s kept going despite
everything.

“On a personal note, Daniel
Jackson and I are the only two here now that were here on that original mission.
Sometimes, I think we’ve seen it all. We have, quite literally, been through
hell together, been through life and death together. We’ve both had to make
decisions, but he’s sacrificed more than anyone else here. A lot of you have
been along for that ride from almost the beginning as well, so you know what
I’m talking about.”

Again, he saw nodding heads.
Again, he realized Daniel had no idea what he was doing. This was going to be a
great surprise.

“Now, the reason for this
little story is this. It is with great pride that my first order of business as
commander of this base is to correct an oversight that’s been too long in the
coming. It’s to present a special award to Doctor Daniel Jackson for
everything he has done for SG-1, for this base, for the Earth and for humanity
here and elsewhere.”

Jack stopped speaking as the
applause echoed through the chamber. Daniel was staring at him, dumbfounded,
when Jack jerked his head in the “get up here” motion. Sam had to give
Daniel a little push to get him started, and he walked up the ramp beside Jack.

Again, Jack cleared his throat
and whispered, “Since this was probably the one and only time I’ll ever see
you stand at attention, I get to be formal too. Don’t think I’ll ever do it
again.”

“I can’t see you doing it
this time,” Daniel answered back.

“Doctor Daniel Jackson, the
President of the
United States
has placed special trust and confidence in your patriotism, integrity and
abilities. You have selflessly and courageously given your knowledge, your
skills and on more than one occasion your life in defense of not only this
planet and your team but also innocent lives, some who I’m still regretting
you helped.”

“Jack,” Daniel started to
quietly protest.

“Hey, I’m just saying,”
Jack stopped him as he placed the specially designed medal around Daniel’s
neck. It was a one of a kind, designed specifically for Daniel by the president
himself. Then, in a loud voice, “For bravery above and beyond the call of duty
for either a civilian or military personnel, for all the sacrifices you’ve
made and for all that you’ve given to those who didn’t know they could ask,
it is my privilege and pleasure to present to you this Special Medal of Honor.
The president regrets that he couldn’t be here today to award you this medal,
but it is my honor to be the one to give it to you. It’s a thank you that’s
long overdue.”

Carter and Teal’c led the
applause, and Jack knew that Daniel didn’t think he deserved any of it. Daniel
didn’t know how wrong he was.

Given the almost overwhelmed
look on Daniel’s face, it had been a perfect surprise.

~~~~~

“I’m still not calling you sir,”
Daniel told him as they unpacked Jack’s personal items into his new office.

“You’d better not. I need
one person here who can call me an ass and get away with it,” Jack told him as
he placed a picture of himself, Sara and Charlie on one side of the credenza,
another of SG-1 on the other. “Besides, you’re going to have a lot more to
do from now on. You’ll be too busy to call me sir.”

Daniel stopped unpacking, turned
and stared at Jack. “More?”

“An official
second-in-command’s work is never done. Trust me. Besides, with me in charge,
you’ll have more paperwork than you ever had before,” he said without
missing a beat as he emptied the last box.

“What do you mean official
second-in-command?”

“You’re second-in-command of
the base. You’ve had that job since Weir was here.”

“No, I haven’t,” Daniel
protested. “That’s Colonel Reynolds’ job.”

Jack glanced at Daniel who had
stopped unpacking. “Wait a minute, you didn’t know?” he asked Seeing
Daniel shrug and shake his head, Jack walked over to the door and closed it.
This conversation was not one to be overheard by anyone else. He then gave
Daniel a little push toward a chair, and he sat down in the other – the
comfortable one that
Hammond
had left him.

“Okay,
I’m guessing that you were kept in the dark on purpose. Originally, the
president wanted to put you in charge of the base when he moved
Hammond
up.”

“What? Me? Why?”

How best to explain… what had
the president said?

After the president gave Jack his orders of awarding Daniel his medal,
they sat down to discuss base policy and future plans.

“I’m gonna level with you, Jack,” the president said. “There was
a lot going on here, and some of my decisions for the SGC had to do with
flushing out some bad guys here in
Washington
.”

The president laughed. “I knew Kinsey couldn’t be trusted when we
were campaigning, but he practically delivered
Florida
during the election. I didn’t know about the NID or the SGC or the Goa’uld
until my first day in office. I read a lot of reports, even some that aren’t
official. I knew that if Kinsey could, he’d find another way to get control of
the SGC. That base is our first, last and best hope for surviving this war
we’ve got going out there. Kinsey wants to either shut it down or use it for
himself. He had to go.”

“So you set up a trap?”

“Of sorts. I knew the SGC couldn’t stay secret forever with the NID
trying to mess up things, and if we had a non-military person in charge, it
might look a little better to our allies and enemies here on this plane when it
went public. My first and best choice obviously was Doctor Daniel Jackson. He
knows the people and the routines. He’s trusted by allies both here and off
world. He’s got the experience needed, and there’s no problem between him
and any of the personnel at the base.”

“Daniel would have been my first choice, too, but...” Jack prompted
him

“But, Kinsey would have had
Jackson
assassinated if I named him as the new commander, so I decided to submarine
him. I got Kinsey to recruit Weir, and that gave him the idea that he could have
a lot of influence over her. When he tried exerting that influence and Weir
wasn’t playing ball with him, he tried to force the issue and then that opened
up an opportunity for me to remove him from the vice-president’s office.”

“So Kinsey’s been retired,” Jack answered, knowing he wouldn’t
be the only one amused at the thought.

“Definitely. He’s too much in the public eye for me to retire him
permanently, so I’m settling for second best and removing him from public
life. Anyway, that brings us back to Doctor Jackson. After Anubis was defeated
and things were getting back to normal at the SGC, I found out that the NID was
still a threat, so moving
Jackson
up to commander of the base was out of the question. I asked him to help Weir
any way he could. She’s not military and has never worked at a military base,
so having a civilian with that experience right there with her was my second
best option. It kept him safe from NID involvement for a little longer.”

It all made sense. Still, there was one little problem. “With Weir
being moved to the Antarctic –”

“It’s the best and safest place for her,” the president explained.
“She’s a negotiator and we’ve got a lot of different countries wanting in
on the Antarctic base. She’ll be more useful there, and with what she’s
learned at the SGC, she’ll have a better idea on how to negotiate with
everyone there. She understands what’s at s
tak
e.”

“So I can keep Daniel as my second-in-command?” Jack asked.

The president smiled.

Daniel’s forehead squinted as
he processed this new revelation in his life. “But I wasn’t the
second-in-command. The president asked me to help her out since I was a civilian
and she might have some problems in a military situation. That was all.”

“Yeah, I’m guessing that’s
what he told you, but that wasn’t
the truth.”

Daniel sat back and stared. He
hadn’t known he’d been given that type of authority. “Now what?”

“Now, you and Colonel Reynolds
will both be second-in-command with you in seniority. You’ll run the base when
I’m not here and do all those second-in-commanding things when I am here;
he’ll handle most of the military issues but you’ll have the final word.”

For the first time, Jack saw
Daniel absolutely speechless. He really hadn’t known that he’d been acting
as a second-in-command for Weir.

“Oh,” he finally said.

“Anyway, the president figured
that since you and I can argue, fuss and fight and still be friends, we’d have
the best chance of running this place with all the crap that’s going on out
there. The last thing I need advising me is a yes, sir; no, sir; whatever you say, sir kind of officer. The
president has put it in writing so it’s official now.”

~~~~~

Of all the strange, ridiculous,
miraculous things Daniel had heard in his life, this was definitely a new one.
He was second-in-command of the base? A civilian? And he didn’t know about it?

Was he not getting all of his
memos?

Maybe he should have known
something was up when Siler installed a red phone in his office, one that could
be used to call the president. He thought it was so the president could check up
on Weir’s progress without alarming anyone, but he was actually the
second-in-command of the most top-secret base on the planet?

“Okay,” Daniel was finally
able to say. “So what do I do?”

“What you’ve been doing for
the last couple of months, only now it’s official. Your signature will have
the same authority mine does, you get to order all those military types around,
and you’ll be working with me instead of Weir.”

“Am I still on SG-1?”

“Yeah, and Reynolds is still a
team leader too. Look, I know this is coming out of left field, but I need you.
You know, with that personal advisor and friend kind of helpfulness.”

He thought it over. As many
opportunities this opened up for him, there were a few things that took
precedence. “Does that mean I get a raise and a better parking spot?”

“You bet, and the job does
come with a bunch of other fringe benefits,” Jack said as reached into his
pocket and then tossed Daniel a set of keys. “A bigger paycheck, parking spot,
new car...”

Daniel looked at the keys in his
hand, then at Jack who was sitting there with that self-satisfied smug look on
his face. Jack knew, he knew what Daniel’s answer would be.

Still, there was one thing that
Jack needed to know before they went any further, before they went over any new
duties, and before they unpacked another item from any box. “Okay, but I’m
still not calling you sir.”